Argentine collector Eduardo Costantini pays record US$35 million for Frida Kahlo work
-
Loading... - Patricia Turner
- 01 Dec 2021
- 658 Views
- 0 Like
- 0 Comment
A rare painting by Frida Kahlo sold in a New York auction house Tuesday for almost US$35 million, a record price for a work by the iconic Mexican artist and for a Latino artist.
A self-portrait of Kahlo entitled Diego y yo ("Diego and me," 1949), where the face of the painter's husband Diego Rivera appears on her forehead, smashed the former record of US$8 million set by a Kahlo in 2016.
That made it the most expensive Latin American work of art in history sold at auction, the previous record having gone to a painting by Diego Rivera himself, whose work Los Rivales (1931) sold for US$9.76 million in 2018.
The buyer was Argentine collector and businessman Eduardo Costantini, founder of the Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (MALBA), although this work is for his private collection.
The businessman bid via telephone through Anna Di Stasi, Sotheby's director for Latin America, the auction house told AFP.
In 1995, Constantini – the son of an Italian immigrant who arrived in Buenos Aires in the early 20th century – paid a record US$3.2 million for Frida Kahlo's Autorretrato con chango y loro "(Self-Portrait with Monkey and Parrot") (1942).
In 2016 he paid just over US$16 million for Diego Rivera's Baile en Tehuantepec ("Dance in Tehuantepec") (1928). Rivera's previous record, from 1995, was just over US$3 million.
Diego y yo is emblematic of Kahlo's self-portraits, known for their intense and enigmatic gaze that made the Mexican painter, a feminist icon, famous around the world. Read More…
